Organization...Day One

Well, looks like I am gonna be posting early this week.  It is snowing here in Central Texas and if I have to be shut in and am on my computer...I am sure of you are too.  So...here we go!!!

We are going to be talking about organizing your art/craft room on and off for the next few weeks, as I am redoing mine!  It is clean enough and somewhat organized now, but I know it can be better.  My room is a 10'x13' bedroom that is located in the back of the house.  The walls are purple, the carpet is a paint spotted dirty cream color, and the walls are lined with bookcases.  See, it looks manageable.

But, the closet is a mess.  When a closet looks this bad, it doesn't get used, everything stays buried and you have to dig or purchase new stuff.  So, in the next few weeks, as the room gets cleaned and gone through, so of the stuff in the closet will come out.  I am sure if you have a closet like this, there are things in there that need to be trashed or given to your crafty friends.  I know my students are looking forward to our classes for the next month or so!  lol  (oh, there, see the purple wall!)

Let's look at one of my boxes of ribbon.  This is what it looked like on the shelf, there were two boxes full.  Inside, it was in rows and had a couple extras thrown on top.  By the way, watch your local craft stores, these photo storage boxes go on sale all the time!!  In fact, I just picked up four more this week for just over $2 each.  You will see in future posts how and where I have used them in this room.  Pretty and easily stacked.

It has all been wrapped and filed and now there is enough room for BOTH boxes of ribbon in the one box.  You would be surprised how much room those spools take up...anyone got a craft project for all these empty spools??  What to do with them for now??  Easy, thread them all together and hang them from the ceiling in the garage.

Now, on to the process and then I will reveal the final project.  Take and unroll the entire spool, start rolling it around the two of the inserts that come in the photo boxes.  You might have to cut down those pieces of cardboard depending on how much ribbon there is.  Here is a photo of where the ribbons are so long that they wrap around so many times that the ribbon roll is too tall for the box now.  See how it sticks up above the edge of the box?  See the second photo, I cut down the cardboard inserts and re-wrapped the ribbons.

You ready for this?  Let's go back and take a look at the before photo and then the after will be right below that one.  I love my new ribbon storage, and I have tried dowel rods and lots of other things.  Soooo....what do you think???

Isn't that AWESOME!!!!  Well, one of many boxes down, and now I even have an extra box to put more stuff into later!!!  Yippee!!!

Now, let me show you how I organized all my little Sizzix and Cricut cut out shapes.  This is really easy and it uses up a LOT of those little scraps of paper.  Don't have one of those machines that cut out the shapes that you can use in altered art or scrapbooking??  There are folks that sell them on ebay, yes, you can order pre-cut shapes and even tell them what color you want them in.  Do you have a friend that has a lot of punches that you like?  Borrow them for a couple days and spend an evening in front of the tv punching a few and slip them into snack bags until you get your organization container, and then just transfer them over.  I have even used a muffin tin to organize while I am between projects.  Ok, here they are.

Then, I got another one of these tool and hardware organizers and did the entire alphabet.  Be sure to keep the outside on the alphabet too, never know when you might want those pieces.  Oh, I just used a black permanent marker to draw the letter on the outside, and it looks like the actual letter shape (font).  You could even tape them to the inside and let them show through. 

Wow!!  I feel like I got a lot done.  Eventually, you are going to see the new paint, shelving, and floor.  This is going to have to do for now.  

What am I going to do next week??  To be honest with you, I am not quite sure yet.  I have so many ideas flowing in my brain, and so many projects in the works.  I do know that we all have one little area of wasted space in our homes, and so I will post a small section on that next week along with my regular post.  

Why don't you post some questions along with your comments and let me know what kinds of things you would like to read about.  You never know, I might pick your question to write the next blog about!!!  See ya in a week, Pam

Happy New Year

After being asked all last year to start a blog, I am attempting it.  We will see how it goes.

Let me start with a project that I did last year.  I had broken a toe, just that dreaded pinky, and it wouldn't heal properly.  The doctor said to get off the foot for four weeks and stay off of it.  What to do, I had no intentions of just sitting and being a couch potato for four weeks...

I have no grandkids at this time, but I do have a great niece and two great nephews that often come over for a day or two at a time.  Play food made out of felt, sounds like fun, and I can do it laying back in the recliner.  On the way home, I went by the sewing store and got some inexpensive felt.  I got about 1/2 a yard of about ten different colors, it didn't hurt any that it was on sale for 50% off.

Oh what fun.  The long and short of it is that I did a ton of play food and had fun doing it.  Entered a plateful of it at the Texas State Fair in the fall and won a third place ribbon in the felt category.  Wow!  What a surprise.  There are lots of patterns out there on the web for making play food out of felt, but I just pretty much drew out a rough sketch and winged it.  Let's take a look at each picture below and do a breakdown.

The butter tabs are just little yellow squares sewn together.  The syrup is wiggly blobs stitched together.  The stitch used on everything is just a simple blanket stitch unless I tell you otherwise.   Pancakes are a top and bottom and then a lighter shade that goes all the way around for the thickness of the cake.  Be sure to cut out five or six layers of felt to stack inside for the stuffing.  This stacking technique is also used to make the sliced bread later.  The pop tarts are made with just one extra layer inside, and be sure to add little stitches to make the little sprinkle marks.  The donuts are done on machine and I would suggest you either find a tutorial or skip them, not all that great in person and very hard to stuff.  Bacon is just a two dark middle layers and then the fatty lighter colors are stitched on, but be sure to do a running stitch through it so that it ripples like real bacon.  The eggs are a white yolk, cut a circle and blanket stitch all around, turn over and clip a seam in the back to stuff it, slip stitch it shut.  Take another layer of white and sew to the back of the eggs.

Hopefully all this is starting to actually make some sense to you.  The mayo, catchup, mustard, and American cheese are all done the same way, two layers just blanket stitch together.  Lettuce is two layers together and then you do some veins in the center area to make it ruffle.  Pickles are circles with little seeds in the center.  Beef patties are stuffed and then some stitches through the center to make it look all rippled.  Put seeds on your bun before you sew it together, stuff the top and just do layers of felt for the bottom.

You should be able to look at this photo and understand what to do.  The bread is darker around the edges.  There is mayo, mustard, more lettuce, American cheese, Swiss cheese (be sure to stitch the holes also), peanut butter, and grape jelly.  Oh, the chips...take two large chunks of the fabric, lay on top of each other and stitch 1/4" lines all across the entire length and width of the felt.  Don't worry about back stitching or tying off knots.  Freehand cut some ovals, those are now your chips.  Too easy, right?

Wedges of any fruit is a part of a circle and then the skin area, strawberries are a circle with a wedge cut out, bananas and kiwi are just circles.  You might find it easier to actually cut up an apple and trace the pcs and use them for sewing.  Don't forget all the tiny seeds.

The picture below, my steak is just a bone stitched on the meat, several thicknesses of felt for the stuffing, lay them flat just like before and stitch the sides on.  The green beans are just long strips that I rolled up and then took a seam down the side.  So now, how easy was all of that!  Let me know what you think, and if you make some play food, be sure to send me your photos.  Please do not use this as a money maker, I am posting it out there for free, not for any one persons gain.

Oh what fun.  The long and short of it is that I did a ton of play food and had fun doing it.  Entered a plateful of it at the Texas State Fair in the fall and won a third place ribbon in the felt category.  Wow!  What a surprise.  There are lots of patterns out there on the web for making play food out of felt, but I just pretty much drew out a rough sketch and winged it.  I hope that you have enjoyed this, and I will try to blog once a week.  Be sure to bookmark me and check in next week when I write about gaining storage with an old piece of luggage.